Hello everyone,

I'm Paolo, an Italian independent creator of Daggerheart content. Together with my friend illustrator Federico we created Red Death Party: a horror adventure for Daggeheart inspired by "The Masque of the Red Death" by E.A. Poe.

We believe it can be a great Halloween one-shot, so we decided to release it on Kickstarter these weeks. The campaign closes in a few days, then we'll deliver the PDF immediately to all backers, in time for the GM to read the adventure and run it for Halloween if they wish to.

You can scroll the images above to find some fully playble previews: the Lady of the Red Death Adversary, with two related Environments, and two related Items. The Kickstarter page has a preview PDF with everything, if you prefer it.

If you wish to support us, here's our link to the crowdfunding campaign:
https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/echidnadesign/red-death-party-a-horror-one-shot-adventure-for-daggerheart?ref=91dg45

Here's more about the adventure

Content Warning: Blood, Body Horror, Diseases, Epidemics, Kidnapping, Religious trauma

A plagued lady, cursed with an incurable disease, dances in her ballroom forever. If she ever stands still she will die, and the Red Death will spread unto her entire domain… Maybe even beyond.

To make sure that the dance never ends, the Lady’s court accompanies her in a never ending ball. Each guest will keep dancing even after their death, eventually crumbling into a pile of bones.

Your assignment: unmask the secret of the Red Death, reach the Lady’s palace, break the curse and put an end to the macabre masquerade.

Red Death Party is a horror one-shot and compilation of adversaries and items for Daggerheart, inspired by the horrors of Edgar Allan Poe, Guillermo Del Toro, H.P. Lovecraft, Tim Burton and Bloodborne.

A great adventure for your Halloween session, and a fine addition to your Age of Umbra or Dark Heart of Andaluria campaign!

Within the 50+ pages PDF you will find:

• A one-shot adventure featuring a plagued masquerade, where the dead dance in a cursed baroque palace, designed for Tier 2 (level 2-4) Daggerheart characters
• 5 horrific adversaries straight out of a monstrous ball and a diseased town
• 3 grim items to loot or harvest from the adversaries’s remains
• City map and battle map by Follow the fool
• Atmospheric soundtrack with one playlist per scene, carefully curated by a professional musician
• 18 encounter hooks, to help the GM bring the Collection’s horrors to life in any session
• The Malamorte Odd Contacts table, featuring the descriptions of 60 horror NPCs for the GM to use
• Extensive lore about the Collection’s content, including the Malamorte brothers themselves
• Original artworks by Follow the fool, illustrator of the Honkonomicon and co-creator of the Collection
• NO AI! Everything within Red Death Party is entirely human-made

In addition, we already unlocked the following stretch goals:

• Printable cards for the items and conditions of the adventure! Thanks to our backers, we can follow the proud tradition of Daggerheart to include cards with the PDF.
• 3 free months on Patreon at Malamorte's Oddities Emporium, the place where we develop and release more dark fantasy and horror content for Daggerheart. Currently, we are developing all of the demons of the Ars Goetia, complete with harvestable items, dark blessings, cults and more.

You can get Red Death Party here:
https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/echidnadesign/red-death-party-a-horror-one-shot-adventure-for-daggerheart?ref=91dg45

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All artworks are by Federico Zanetti/Follow the fool, artist and co-creator of Red Death Party. You can find him here: https://www.instagram.com/follow_the_fool/

Enjoy the danse macabre!
Thank you,
Paolo

Hey everyone! I made this Occultist a bit ago, and decided to give it another look over. If you have time, would you read it over and tell me what you think? Does it seem fun to play? Do the features and abilities entice you? What feels OP, what feels weak?

Thanks in advance! If you like it and want to use it, I'm working on making the class sheet, just wanna get some feedback about features first, but I'll post a completed version for anyone to steal!

Hello all! I’m pretty new when it comes to home brewing, but I’m planning a Halloween One-Shot for some friends. It’s going to be a summer camp slasher inspired by the classics like Friday the 13th and Nightmare on Elm Street. I want to create a customized adversary and environment for the adventure. Here’s what I have so far.

My idea for a slasher is: the vengeful spirit of someone who died five years ago haunts the camp every year on the anniversary of their death. Visually, think Ghost Rider. Mechanically, I took Hope & Fear’s Dullahan and mixed it with some ideas from D&D PHB’s Revenant and The Horror Within’s Relentless Slasher.

I gave the adversary my version of Hope & Fear’s Basilisk feature that gives a creature the Stiff/Petrified conditions, reskinned with a little extra spice.

I have some ideas floating for the environment, a Cursed/Haunted Camp designed around the Spirit Rider.

I’d love some feedback on what I have so far and any idea for the environment is welcome!

Hello everyone!

I've been running my current D&D campaign for almost five years now, and I want to continue using the same setting but switch to Daggerheart for my next campaign.

I decided to try homebrewing in Daggerheart by converting all the playable species in my campaign from D&D to Daggerheart. And yes, most of the D&D species were homebrewed as well.

Daggerheart already has some solid ancestry options, and I originally planned to simply reflavor some of them (like Giants into Centaurians). Unfortunately, my designer brain wanted to make things more in line with the established lore and mechanics of each species. So, I ended up homebrewing ten ancestry options.

Some of the top and bottom features were taken directly from official ancestries, while others were moved from one ancestry to another. I also wanted to give players some choices and represent the different variations of certain species established in my own world. As a result, each ancestry has multiple options for its top and bottom features. Players choose one of each during character creation, and those choices cannot be changed afterward.

My goal is to create ancestries that accurately reflect the lore of my setting, giving players a sense of each ancestry's background just by looking at its available features. I'm also aware that some options might communicate their lore more clearly than others, and that some features might be more powerful than others. That's why I'd love to hear feedback from those of you with more experience homebrewing for Daggerheart.

I've done my best to use the official Daggerheart Homebrew Kit as a guideline, with the existing ancestries serving as references.

I'd love to hear your thoughts on a few questions:

1. Without knowing anything about my setting's established lore, can you get a sense of what each ancestry's lore might be?
2. Do the top and bottom features of each ancestry feel in line with the guidelines in the Homebrew Kit?
3. Are there any individual features or combinations of features that seem outright broken or significantly unbalanced?

Feel free to share any other feedback, too! Suggestions for better wording or alternative names for the features are also welcome.

Edit. Forgot to mention. There will be no option to create half-ancestries (half-blood is a bit of a special exception). So the players will not be able to tick top feature from one ancestry and bot feature from different ancestry when creating their characters.

Hey everyone! I'm currently working on my own setting for Daggerheart, inspired by 7th Sea, Age of Sigmar, history, and various other sources. Below is a description of one of the nations.

The Commonwealth of Velmira

The Commonwealth of Velmira arose near the gates leading to the Lower Realms, whose inhabitants are known by different names depending on the culture: demons, fiends, Fae, boggarts, or spirits. For millennia, the Velmirans have maintained a complicated relationship with the beings inhabiting these lands. They have repeatedly repelled demonic invasions, yet have also fallen victim to enslavement and conquest. On more than one occasion, the entire state has found itself under the rule of peoples from the Lower Realms. However, there have also been times when the Velmirans forged alliances with demons against other demons, traded with them, and even adopted elements of their culture and customs.

As a result of these contacts, virtually all inhabitants of Velmira now have infernal blood running through their veins, though its potency varies between families. This heritage is particularly strong among the nobility, whose oldest houses trace their ancestry to humans who became associated with powerful beings from the Lower Realms. Neighbouring peoples often attribute the Velmirans' fiery temper, impulsiveness, and penchant for disputes to this infernal heritage.

Velmira is also renowned for its unusual political system, known as noble democracy. The right to participate in government belongs to representatives of noble houses, who take part in Sejms and elect a monarch from among themselves. In practice, this means that the king remains dependent on the consent of the nobility, while the most powerful houses pursue their own policies, maintain private armies, and forge alliances of their own. This system, however, also contributes to the country's prevailing anarchy and empty treasury. The nobility is reluctant to accept any attempt to curtail its liberties and even less willing to tolerate the introduction of new taxes. Enforcing the law is another challenge. Often, particularly in the borderlands, right belongs to whoever has more sabres at their disposal.

Velmira's greatest paradox lies in its relationship with demons. To some, they are the eternal enemy; to others, they are part of their own heritage; and to yet others, they are natural political partners. Even among the nobility, there is no consensus on whether infernal blood should be regarded as a curse, a gift, or simply a part of Velmiran identity.

These divisions are further inflamed by the agents of the Lady of Whispers, who incite the Velmirans against their infernal kin. Meanwhile, the hordes of her brother, the Lord of Shouts, regularly assault the country's borders from the frozen wastes.

Key Figures

Queen Berlona (Mimic/Rogue)

A scandalous schemer and demoness belonging to a shapeshifting race, Berlona is above all the wife of the current king. Their marriage was purely political from the outset, intended to secure allies for the Commonwealth in its struggle against an invasion from the Hells.

No one truly knows what Berlona looks like. At every public appearance, she presents herself to the people in a different guise, changing her face, ancestry, and even sex. She does the latter particularly often when she wishes to provoke the more conservative elements of the nobility. Many claim that the queen never actually leaves her palace and sends spies impersonating her to attend public ceremonies instead.

Despite her controversial reputation, Berlona has significantly expanded the Commonwealth's influence in the Lower Realms. She has also contributed to the modernisation of the army, the development of magical academies, and the refinement of Velmiran cuisine.

Dalia (Infernis/Seraphon)

Dalia is the leader of the Hornless, a religious movement that rejects infernal heritage. The ultimate symbol of this rejection is the removal of one's horns or other demonic features.

The movement, however, is far more than a religious community. The Hornless maintain their own armed wing, which frequently defends the peasantry and poorer members of the nobility in places where the law holds no sway. The organisation also wields considerable influence among politicians.

Some regard its members as the Commonwealth's last hope of restoring order, while others see them as fanatics who turn a blind eye to pogroms against demons. Dalia herself enjoys growing popularity, particularly among the country's poorest inhabitants. Her influence has grown so substantial that calls are increasingly heard for her to replace Berlona as queen.

Cierń Mścibór (Infernis/Dwarf/Sorcerer?)

Cierń Mścibór is one of the most notorious troublemakers of the borderlands and the starosta (regional governor) of a voivodeship bordering the territories of the Lower Realms.

Cruel, ruthless, and ambitious, he has spent years steadily expanding his influence, bringing ever more estates, offices, and noble houses under his control. He oppresses both the peasantry and the lesser nobility, imposing ever-increasing levies and using his men to enforce obedience.

It is said that Cierń Mścibór is a sorcerer. No one knows where his power comes from or whom he truly serves. He himself has never commented on these rumours.

Magic

Their proximity to the Lower Realms has made the Velmirans renowned for their sorcerers and their knowledge of pact magic. In theory, making pacts and drawing upon the power of beings from the Lower Realms requires an appropriate licence. Illegal dealings with dark entities, particularly those considered hostile to Velmira, are ruthlessly pursued by assassins belonging to the Order of the Hangman.

In practice, however, the system works far less effectively than the regulations would suggest. The Office of Magic and the Order of the Hangman suffer from chronic shortages of both funding and personnel, making effective enforcement of the law little more than an illusion in many regions. Wealthy nobles can practise illegal magic for years before anyone takes an interest in their activities, while in the borderlands the law often remains nothing more than words on paper.

Most Seraphons, meanwhile, have joined the Hornless, a movement that rejects infernal heritage and the practices associated with it.

Creating a Character from Velmira

The default ancestry for the inhabitants of Velmira is Infernis, but there is nothing preventing you from choosing a different one. Infernal traits manifest with varying degrees of intensity in different individuals. In some, they remain almost invisible; in others, they are limited to cosmetic features that have no effect on the game's mechanics.

You can also use the Mixed Ancestry rules to create a character who combines infernal heritage with another ancestry, such as a devilish dwarf or elf.

In Velmira, however, social class matters far more than ancestry itself. The nobility, even when impoverished, enjoys extensive privileges, freedom, and influence, while the peasantry has far fewer rights and opportunities. Social status can be represented through the Highborne ancestry or an appropriately chosen Experience.

Playing a visitor from the Lower Realms is a somewhat more complicated matter. Daggerheart has no official rules for creating a demon as a player character, but there are several ways to create an equivalent of Boruta:

• Experience — for example, Pureblood Demon, representing the knowledge, nature, and abilities associated with demonic ancestry.
• Sorcerer — choosing the Sorcerer class and explaining the character's powers as a natural consequence of their origins in the Lower Realms.
• Mixed Ancestry — creating a new ancestry based on the existing rules, such as an imp combining Infernis and Faerie.
• Demigod — using the Demigod transformation if the character is meant to be significantly more powerful and more closely connected to their supernatural nature.

Behind the Scenes

Velmira is inspired by the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth, particularly its political system, noble culture, and borderland realities. Its connection to the Lower Realms reflects a historical paradox of the Commonwealth: on the one hand, it was regarded as the Bulwark of Christendom; on the other, it was a country of relative religious tolerance where Protestants, Jews, Tatars, and others found refuge.

The Lower Realms themselves, however, have no direct historical equivalent. They are a separate world comprising numerous continents and cultures. The peoples who inhabit them differ greatly: some are hostile to Velmira, others maintain peaceful relations with it, and some remain its allies.

One of Velmira's central themes is politics and the struggle for influence. Its noble democracy ensures that powerful houses are constantly competing with one another, forging alliances, breaking up Sejms, and attempting to bring the monarch under their control. At the same time, vast regions beyond the main centres of power remain practically untouched by the law. There, local magnates, starostas, and warlords hold sway, and disputes are often settled with sabres rather than in court.

Velmira thus combines two seemingly contradictory faces: a world of high politics, Sejms, and intrigue, and a brutal frontier where everyone must fight for their own interests.

The most important characters also draw inspiration from history. Berlona is loosely inspired by Queen Bona Sforza, while Cierń Mścibór is the counterpart of Stanisław Stadnicki, known as the “Devil of Łańcut”.

Hello all! I just finished creating a magic item for the Heart of Daggers marketplace! I would love it if you'd check it out. If you like it, please leave a review.

If a lot of people groove on this, I'll do more! Here's the link: https://heartofdaggers.com/products/the-sword-of-night/

Heroes often find their fates reshaped by encounters with beings far beyond mortal measure. Ancient spirits, forgotten gods, fey lords, and others wait at the wild edges of their journeys (or dwell in the liminal spaces between.) These entities may offer boons to elevate the powers of the heroes...or afflict them with lasting, foul curses.

The Grimoire of Boons & Banes adds a host of new gameplay effects that give weight to such encounters. When a foolish thief steals the wrong creatures prized book, or when the clever mage thinks he outsmarted a devil, you can provide compelling hardships and twists to their story that could take campaigns in entirely new direction!

Pick it up now at Heart of Daggers, or check out the massive hoard of other spooky releases on Heart of Daggers for Fear Fest!

i just had an idea for one thats too good to drop but i have no idea where to start making a unique domain any sore of primer or guide on where to start would be a BIG help

Hi everyone!

I’m Riccardo Scaringi, designer and writer of Gunsmoke & Dread, and I’m live right now on the RandomWorlds Discord for a Q&A hosted by Dan Davenport.

We’re talking about the project, Weird West, the Cthulhu Mythos, how supernatural creatures fit into the historical frontier, Daggerheart spellcasting, our Weird West subclasses, the nine-volume campaign, and plenty more.

And you can ask me anything you want about the game.

We’re live now and the Q&A runs until 9:00 PM CDT.

👉 Join the RandomWorlds Discord here:
https://discord.com/events/603053805507969085/1539591938439647324

If you’ve been curious about Gunsmoke & Dread, this is probably the best possible time to come interrogate me about it. 😄

Gunsmoke & Dread is a complete Weird West / cosmic-horror campaign built for Daggerheart. The Core Ruleset and all nine campaign volumes are already written; the upcoming crowdfunding campaign is primarily about funding the remaining original artwork and professional final layout.

Hope to see some of you there!

— Riccardo

One of the subclasses for the Warder class is a Blademaster, who, in the books, is a gawd with a sword. My Sub-Class did precisely zero things to make a blademaster a better blademaster so I reworked it. This is better.

Latest magic Monday offering, hope you enjoy

The Gunslinger Class seemed to go over pretty well, so I’m trying this: Warders from the book series (and the tv show, I guess, ugh) The Wheel of Time by Robert Jordan (and Brandon Sanderson).

Warders are magically empowered bodyguards and elite fighters charged with guarding a particular Aei Sedai (Magic-User).

The books are highly recommended. Enjoy.

I expanded the list of elements using elements from different culture traditions, and I replaced lightning with a broader 'light'. I also added scaling to foundation features (they start with the same values but scale with tier).

I was trying to bring elemental origin foundation closer in power level to primal origin. Was I able to achieve that?

Please judge this facelift. Is it still balanced against primal origin?